RE: [GZG] [GZG Fiction] Basic Street Fighting Manual

G'day,

> *shrug*  Sovs had a shortage of officers in the worst way,
> I think he was making do with what he had. 

While not quite as bad as for Chuikov that's what I'm trying to press
for here too. The GZG timeline makes it clear a bunch of stuff is tied
up in the outer colonies and I've tried to imply a bunch is tied up on
Earth. So while there is a lot of troops on Mars and its still early on
we don't have a lot of luxury in what's available. I know the media
reports don't paint it that way, but that's intentional so that there
are still surprises in store for those caught up by the media reports.

> Also you said open ground, which didn't make me think
> 'covered in rubble'.	That depends on the size of the rubble.

I think by the time the notes I was cribbing from Stalingrad's open
ground was all rubble ;)

As to the line in question, I dropped the or so it says "When moving
about in open ground over rubble"

> You're also coming close to raising the question of
> 'why bother going into the town at all'?  
>I mean, if the KV are going to defend like lunatics and rig
> most buildings for demo, then you don't get anything out of it. 
> Everyone I've ever read on the subject agrees that going
> into Stalingrad was a mistake.  Cutting off urban areas and
> letting them die on the vine is the way to go if your opponent
> is going to turn every single one into a fortress anyway.

Simple matter is despite the fact for centuries people have known going
in to a city is bad we still do it. That's not going to end by the
GZGverse for two reasons. For one on a terraformed planet like Mars,
even if smashed up the crater and ravine cities are still the most
habitable bits so getting in and rooting around, even with compromised
domes is better than making the place completely unihabitable - humans
still want to live there afterwards. The place is also riddled with
human tunnels let alone whatever the Kra'Vak have so the humans have to
make sure the job is done and pockets don't remain to kick out at them
later - no stone left unturned mentality. Basically they have to (even
putting aside that people will want to because of the meaning of it).

Second, and most importantly for us, it makes a fun game.

> Depends on building materials.  Remember where the US fought. 
> Most of the ruined building I've seen have been slammed with a tank
main
> gun round or three, or even a bomb, and havn't been wiped out
completely.
> The Iraqis build with poured concrete.  From the description of the
heavy
> construction materials in the rest of the piece, that's what I was
imagining
> the KV using rather than wooden frame buildings with drywall for the
interiors.

Good point. Hadn't thought about that.

> You're also contradicting the point above about
> not wanting to bring down buildings as rubble. . .

In the fictional text they don't care, it was in reality that they
didn't want to because it was a problem. No contradiction just two
different settings ;)

> I'm looking at Monte Cassino here.  Yes, rubble chokes off maneuver.
> But if you are the defender, and primarily using infantry, then you
> aren't doing diddly for maneuver anyway.  You can set up fields of
fire
> with heavy weapons in 2nd and 3rd story positions and kill folks who
are
> held up in the rubble.  It also makes for good positions for snipers
and
> machine guns to shoot from ambush.

The Kra'Vak don't want too many infantry battles as they have a more
limited stock of bodies to call on ultimately - that's why the player
here wanted to use bigger weapons and more vehicles (the human players
weren't told of the restrictions and had to figure that for themselves).
End result KV player wanted to get more into DS games and even in SG
wanted his big tanks in there to make things tough for the infantry.
Human decisions and a few bad rools meant it didn't go his way. Part of
the fun of playing it out is some people/aliens make mistakes, leads to
some interesting (and unscheduled) plot points.

> Lots of things move faster than WWII these days.  :)

True, want to hazard a guess at how fast we'd learn how to beat an
alien? ;)

Beth

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